


Universal Headaches - Revised

by Something_clever



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Dimensions, Alternate Universe, F/M, Silly
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-15
Updated: 2021-01-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:53:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26485207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Something_clever/pseuds/Something_clever
Summary: REVISED EDITION: Sutton is living the average life. That is, until The Avengers suddenly appear out of nowhere! Now she's stuck babysitting them, and Loki, until they can find a way home. It should be easy, right? No problem. That is, unless the government noticed them too. Or if Loki acts on this sudden interest in her, so-called, "potential".
Comments: 5
Kudos: 5





	1. Chapter 1

Sutton shoved through throngs of people in various states of costumed dress and otherwise as she made her way out of the conference center and onto the street. It was hard to see over the crowd, and people’s hats and headdresses and weird, bulky weaponry didn’t help her already low vantage point. 

“Chase!” She called again.

There was no sign of her friend and she let out a frustrated huff. According to the clock on her phone, the time before the next ferry was dwindling quickly and she really didn’t want to be stuck in Seattle as twilight set in and the dusky light crept through the alleyways to darken the sidewalks. The thought alone set her teeth on edge. 

Adjusting her blazer, Sutton pushed her way through the crowd with her eyes set. Besides wearing a Loki t-shirt that declared “I Do What I Want”, she at least didn’t stand out as part of the comic con goers, and people paid her less mind than the others decked out in homemade mecha suits or pony ears. She hoped it made her less of a target. 

Half the reason she agreed to come was because Chase promised not to ditch her and leave her to fend for herself in Seattle.

“I’m going to kill him,” she muttered to herself. 

Despite the setback of him disappearing, he at least had his phone still with him, and Sutton was able to hound him for a few vague answers to his whereabouts. Unfortunately, the answers she got only confirmed her worst case suspicions. Misspelled words, missing chunks of information, _way_ too many emojis. 

Chase was drunk. 

He’d promised not to do that either. 

For one brief moment Sutton considered leaving him, a grown man, to find his own way home. But she dismissed the thought near instantly with a heaving sigh. It wouldn’t be right. And she wouldn’t be able to sleep anyway worrying about what he’d done to himself overnight. 

With drinking in mind, Sutton scanned the street to find the nearest bar. There was one a block down that quite a few costumed folk were heading into and she made a beeline for it while praying Chase was there so she could grab him and bolt. 

Inside the bar was loud with excited conversations and some sort of video game music blasting through the speakers. Whoever the owner was, they were taking advantage of the convention crowd and serving limited time themed drinks and snacks. Sutton ignored the menu and scanned over at least two Poison Ivys as she searched. Her luck, it seemed, had pulled through for this moment. 

Chase wasn’t too difficult to identify when he was dressed up as a zombified Batman. Sutton didn’t understand the appeal herself. Zombies weren’t exactly her area of interest, and she preferred superheroes alive, but it was his idea and he thought it was funny, so more power to him. 

She marched purposefully through the bar, careful not to bump into the other patrons, and stopped in front of him with a glare. 

“Chase.”

He turned to face her, his Batman mask skewed enough for some of his shaggy brown hair to slip out and rub against his face paint. 

“Sutton,” he said back. 

She raised one brow and crossed her arms. He followed the moment with a drunken head tilt and she could see the cogs turning as he tried to think. 

“Oops,” he finally said. “I did an oopsie, huh?”

The urge to strangle him did not diminish. 

“Yeah,” she said flatly. “You did. You better be able to walk, because, I swear, if we miss this next ferry I am going to pin a twenty to you and wish you the best of luck.”

“Wait! No!” 

He stood in a hurry, nearly knocking the table back in his rush, and Sutton was relieved to find he could stand. 

“I’m s’posed to protec- you.” He slurred. “Y’gotta. Y’gotta- I gotta walk you back.”

Sutton pinched the bridge of her nose and adjusted her purse. They really didn’t have time for this if they were going to make that ferry. 

“Yeah, you were.” She agreed just to get him to move faster. “And if you want to keep at least one of your promises, you better hurry up and follow me.”

Whether it was the lingering memory of his sober promises or the sternness of her voice, Chase actually did as she said. She was able to keep him moving at a respectable pace as she rushed them downhill several blocks towards the water. By the time they’d reached the terminal, the ferry was doing it’s last, _last_ minute call and she was eternally grateful to her past self for buying their return tickets beforehand. They rushed to join more con-attendees who also had the same idea about getting home before midnight hours.

Both of them slid through the turnstiles behind a couple Ninja Turtles, Chase with a bit less grace than she did, and Sutton felt some of her stress lift as she sat in a booth by a window. Chase flopped down across from her and pulled off his mask without fanfare. His gaze was growing emptier and Sutton scowled. 

“You really have a problem you know. What if I hadn’t found you? What would you have done then?” 

Chase gave her an overdramatic grimace as he shrugged his shoulders. Sutton waited, but that seemed to be the only answer he was going to give her, and she gave a derisive snort before turning away to look out the window once more. 

_Whatever._

The important thing was that they’d made the ferry and Chase lived right down the road from the terminal so she could immediately drop him off on her way home. 

When the ferry docked half an hour later, Chase had deteriorated to near impossible to handle levels and Sutton grunted as she struggled to get him through the parking lot.

“You weren’t even missing for that long,” she snapped. “What did you do? Shots?” 

“I’m Batman.”

“Oh, shut up.”

  
By the time she’d shoved him in the passenger seat of her ancient CR-V, her mood was moving rapidly towards frazzled and fed up, which were never great places for her to be. She hurried to beat any ferry traffic and pulled out onto the road as the sky grew dark. 

“Have your house key ready? Chase? C’mon, Chase. Focus for _five seconds_.”

He patted limply at his pants pockets, a slurred song spilling from his lips that Sutton couldn’t quite identify and didn’t have the patience to anyway. When he failed to pull out a key, Sutton nudged him with her elbow to try and get him back on track. 

“Your key, Chase. We’re almost at your house; look.”

Chase flapped around more frantically and Sutton was relieved to hear the jangle of keys when she pulled into his driveway. She snagged the keys out of his grip after putting the car in park and moved around to the passenger side to help get him out. He sagged against her hold and Sutton grunted again as he squashed her small frame. 

“D’ya think I can- I can grapple that? I think I can-” 

Sutton glared as he pointed up towards the gutter along his roof. 

“Don’t you dare get any stupid ideas when you’re only twenty feet from your couch, or I swear-”

A blue light flashed from the street, cutting her off, and Sutton almost lost her tentative hold on Chase as a chill ran through her and he attempted to twist around to look. 

“Firew ‘rks! Yes!” 

Sutton turned to look, but she didn’t see fireworks. There was a group of people a bit down the road. From what she could see in the dark, some of them looked oddly dressed with some glowing bits, and she brushed them off as some of the comic con attendees who’d also gotten off the ferry. 

With one last grunt and sheer force of will, Sutton managed to open his front door and make sure he landed on his couch before she tossed his keys on his coffee table and shut the door behind her. 

_Good deed: done for the week_. 

Sutton let out a sigh, resituated her blazer, and tried to smooth back her wild curls as she jumped into her car. The group on the road was still loitering there, sending unease through her. It was dark and she was alone, but it was fine. She’d be fine. She was in her car and they were on foot, so really she had the upper hand in the situation.

The self reassurance didn’t totally work as she noted the impressive heights a couple of the men sported. All of them were standing in the direction she needed to go home in and she hoped they’d move without her having to use her horn at this hour. She locked her doors, wincing at the obvious sound, and inched her car forward. None of them made a move to get out of her way and she felt her frustration bubble back up. 

In the wake of her headlights, she could at least tell the group were indeed dressed up as the Avengers. Or at least most of them. She was actually impressed with how the costumes looked even from a distance, and had it been earlier, or she in a better mood, she might’ve stopped to compliment them on their work. But as it was, it was dark and she was tired and ready to start over with a fresh day. 

She rolled down her window a few inches and leaned to call out. 

“Hey! Can you guys get out of the way? I’d like to get home tonight.” 

The entire group turned to face her, but they didn’t seem too intent on moving.

“Ma’am,” one man spoke up, “you really need to leave the area. It’s not safe-” 

“Yeah, yeah. You’ve got big, bad Loki to battle. But listen, take it somewhere else? You can’t play in the middle of the street.”

Her phone tinged and she looked down, distracted for a moment. A different voice from the group let out a disbelieving, 

_“Excuse me?”_

It was a text from her mom, asking her if she’d made it home safely yet. Sutton typed out a quick affirmative reply and sent it before she looked back up. The glowing from one of the costumes was closer now and shone rather brightly in a cool blue. The entire group walked closer and with a better view, her stomach fluttered again. 

“You guys, uh, seriously did a good job of being doppelgängers. It’s almost… disconcerting.”

One member of the group, one of the tall ones, was dressed up like Loki and he watched her intently with a gleam in his eye that made her want to lock her doors all over again. 

“Listen, kid, I don’t know what the hell is going on here, but there’s a dangerous, intergalactic criminal here and you need to leave this to the professionals.” 

The man berating her was dressed like Iron Man, and his face plate flipped up when he rounded her side of the vehicle. Sutton jolted in her seat. Not only did the suit _move_ but it was pretty hard not to recognize the face of _the_ Robert Downey Jr. 

Her brain frizzled and her tongue felt stuck.

It wasn’t Robert Downey Jr., of course. There was no _way_ he was hanging out in a sketchy neighborhood by the pier. 

“Are you drunk?” Slipped passed her lips before she could think. The man who wasn’t RDJ smirked briefly.

“Surprisingly, not today.” 

Sutton had had just about enough foolishness for the day. She gripped her steering wheel and prepared to muster up the nerve to tell them to beat it for good. To call them out on their bluff or game, or whatever it was they were trying to pull. Her mind spun as she came up with the sassiest way to call them fanatics or crazy or _overcommitted_ , but all the words died in her throat. They died because she heard a reverberating grunt, and a shadow moved from out of the darkness where her headlights hadn’t touched. 

_It_ stepped out onto the road and a tingling sensation ran down her face as she grew cold. 

“ _Holy crap._ ” 

“Yeah,” said the Iron Man one. 

“HOLY CRAP.” 

It was _The Hulk_. He moved closer towards the hood of her car, and Sutton unlocked the car and threw open her door to stumble out and scurry back and away.

It wasn’t like some man painted green or some freaky animatronic puppet contraption, but _the Hulk._ His muscles flexed beneath his skin and his grimace exposed large teeth and pale gums. He glanced in her direction only a moment, and she could _feel_ his growl as he went back to keeping his eyes on Loki. _Loki._

If her brain was frizzling before, it short-circuited now. Absolutely sparked and smoked to a concerning degree. 

“You- you guys are the Avengers! How the- am _I_ drunk?”

“Ma’am,” said Captain _freaking_ America. “I’m going to have to ask you to calm down.”

“Well isn’t _that_ a grand idea!” 

This was what she would classify as a Level Ten Freak Out. She always knew she’d been saving it for something good, and there probably wouldn’t be a better time to cash out. 

Despite her panicking thoughts, or perhaps because she was frantically looking for any evidence this was all a hoax, she did notice the two SHIELD agents share a look. 

“How do you know about the Avengers?” 

That was Hawkeye. Clint Barton. And his fingers twitched over his bow as he stared at her. 

“Huh, good point,” said Tony Stark. “I thought we were all part of Fury’s top secret boyband. Well, plus one chick.”

Black Widow shot him a glare. 

“Where are we, mortal?” 

Sutton peeked around her hood to see Thor frowning down at her, a confused crease between his brows. Loki stood right behind him and he was still staring directly at her, so she quickly looked away. 

_Not Tom Hiddleston? NOT Tom Hiddleston._

The group seemed to be in consensus on the question and expected an answer. Sutton swallowed and shifted where she stood. 

“Um, this is Bremerton. Washington. The state, not D.C.”

There were blank stares and murmured confusion. Looks were exchanged and all heads turned towards Loki in a communal glare. Loki held up his non-cuffed hands. Sutton’s hand inched towards her car door, but their attention was redirected back to her too quickly for her to try and bolt. 

“That still doesn’t explain how you know about a secret government program. Or why you seem to be wearing Earth’s current top villain on your shirt.”

The comment from Black Widow didn’t help her lose the team’s interest and Sutton dropped her hand.

_Leave it to the girl to point out her fashion choices._

She winced and attempted to close her blazer over the tee in question. If Loki hadn’t been paying attention to her before, he had laser focus now. Sutton decided she didn’t like that very much. 

“Look,” she started as she edged ever closer to her driver’s side door. “This is hard to explain. I mean, it’s crazy. I feel crazy. Maybe I’m going insane or something and I’m definitely going to have to talk to a therapist about this later. But your best course of action would be to have Loki teleport you back home. The sooner the better, actually.”

“Right. Like we’re going to trust _him_ with our wellbeing.” Spat Hawkeye. “Wait. How _do_ you know his name?”

“She’s wearing him on her shirt, Clint,” Black Widow pointed out yet again. “How’d she get a shirt so fast?”

Sutton shriveled into herself even further. 

“Even if you _begged_ for my help, I could do no such thing.” Loki spoke up. “Nor would I. The power of the Tesseract has faded from my grasp, thanks to _your_ stupidity _._ ” 

It wasn’t exactly clear who he was directing that blame at, but Thor rolled his eyes all the same. 

“Brother, now is not the time.”

“I am _not_ your _brother._ ”

“Can we dial down the angst here for a second?” 

Tony seemed to have decided the fight had died down at this point, and Sutton watched in awe as his suit folded itself down into a box. 

“I didn’t know that model did that,” she muttered to herself. 

Tony quirked an eyebrow at her. 

“Kid, can we hurry this conversation along so we can get out of here. Spill. I have things to do. Like Pepper.”

Sutton’s face instantly heated and she scowled. She swore she saw Captain America do the same. 

“Short version,” she asked. 

“Preferably.”

She took a deep breath and straightened her blazer. Brushed off some imaginary lint and pushed back some stray curls. She sighed. She wished she had more ways to stall. 

“Well, here, you don’t really… exist.”

“Come again?”

Tony leaned back on his left leg and crossed his arms. Sutton huffed. 

“Look! I don’t know if this is some very elaborate and convincing,” she glanced at Hulk, “prank or what. But you are- you’re comic book characters. Actors, icons, whatever! I don’t know what’s going on, but these sorts of things don’t happen to me, and I feel like I’m going a little crazy, ok?”

Captain America, Steve Rogers, actually walked over and placed a hand on her shoulder and she could only freeze and stare at him in wonder. The blue eyes, the square jaw, the waves of heroic competence rolling off him.

“We’re sorry, miss….”

“Sutton.”

“Miss Sutton, if this has put pressure on you. But you have to understand where we’re coming from too.”

“Of course.”

She saw Tony roll his eyes in her peripheral vision and her lips puckered. The team was either looking at her like she _was_ crazy or mind controlled or stupid. She felt the last of her nerves spike. 

“You want proof? Ok. Fine.”

This was the part in a movie when someone might have rolled their shoulders and cracked their knuckles before their impressive display, but she refrained. She pointed to each member of the group in turn instead. 

“Pepper saved your first arc reactor and it saved your life, you’re good at art and had a date, you tried to kill yourself and failed, _something_ happened in Budapest, you were hit by a car twice, and you’re a frost-”

At the expression Loki sent her way, she froze. 

“Uh, I mean. You’re good at lying.”

The group went quiet. Sutton wrung her hands and reached back for the car’s door handle. 

“Yep.” Tony piped up. “She definitely knows too much.”

“I don’t want any trouble,” Sutton snapped. She waved her hands in front of her and just avoided whacking Cap. “I’m not- I’m just trying to get home, ok?” 

“I can’t connect with SHIELD,” the Widow confirmed. 

The mood shifted even further into grim concern. Tony tapped at a watch on his wrist and looked troubled. 

“I’m disconnected from my main servers. I should be able to connect anywhere in the world.”

Sutton snapped the fingers on both hands and wondered if they’d try to stop her from peeling away while she tried to convince herself that this had all been a stress induced fever dream. 

“See. I was telling the truth. You’re welcome and good luck-”

“No, no, no, no. You’re not going anywhere,” said Tony. 

The Hulk grunted again, interrupting Tony, and he sat down heavily with a sort of petulant look. It sent vibrations from the road into her feet and Sutton checked “ _insanely advanced hologram”_ off her list of desperate explanations. 

Whether it was adrenaline and anger wearing off, or their conversation boring Hulk, Sutton didn’t know. But his green skin started to fade and stretch and shrink. And he shrank and shrank until he was no longer a hulking mass, but a man. Until he was back to Bruce Banner sitting in the middle of the road and holding up a torn pair of jeans to protect his modesty. 

He blinked as he adjusted to the light of her headlights. 

“I missed something,” he stated simply.

And that display, if nothing else had, confirmed to Sutton that she wasn’t on an elaborate set of _Punk’d_. Because no feat of make up or practical work could fake what she’d just watched with her own eyes. In person. She couldn’t even try to explain it away to herself. The truth had backed her into a corner and was making rude faces at her. 

_She should have just hid in Chase’s house until they’d left. At least he only snored._

“This isn’t a _fix it tonight_ sort of issue, is it? Why is it even night?” Hawkeye bemoaned from the back of the group. 

Sutton had to agree with him. She felt like bemoaning too. How did one just… put back fictional characters from wherever it was they came from? At the moment, she didn’t have nearly the brain power to even ponder it. As it was, she felt shocked stupid and this confrontation had delayed her from getting the sleep she’d originally been chasing. 

“Doesn’t seem like it,” Cap agreed. But his voice was quiet and without some of the performance it’d had before. 

“Really, what’s going on,” asked Bruce. 

“Perhaps the lady Sutton could provide a place of rest until the morning,” Thor said with a hopeful lilt. 

Sutton grimaced. Whatever insane event was going on, she didn’t exactly want to leap into it. Did she like The Avengers? Yes! She liked the movies. Movies that she could invest in and enjoy and then put back on the shelf when the DVD stopped playing. 

Before she could respond or even think to politely decline, Tony marched around the car, opened the passenger side door, and tossed his suit inside. 

“That sounds like a great idea, Point Break.”

“Oh, uh, well, actually-”

Tony looked challengingly at her, that same brow arched high. 

“Or we could detain you for accessing top secret information.” 

Sutton threw her hands down at her sides. 

“It’s not top secret! I told you!” 

But her arguments amounted to nothing. The entire crew, Loki unfortunately included, squeezed themselves into her car against all odds, and Sutton had no choice but to climb back into the driver’s seat and finally continue down the road. 

This wasn’t how her evening was supposed to go. She had a feeling the morning wouldn’t be much better.


	2. Chapter 2

It was a tense, awkward drive back to her house. The radio's volume barely registered and it only served to enunciate how quiet everyone was. Though Sutton couldn't say that she'd rather have a boisterous conversation. The mutual silence at least gave her a moment to retreat into herself and think. Or let her thoughts spiral. But she told herself it was just thinking.

She found herself eternally grateful that her roommate had just left for a three month backpacking trip in Australia. On a walkabout. _To find herself._ Because her parents had money and she could. Never mind that she hadn't even invited Sutton to go. It wasn't like Sutton was envious at all.

But at least she didn't have to explain returning home with a car full of fictional characters.

She'd turned the porch light on before leaving, so she at least wouldn't have to stumble and fumble around to find the door. More decent planning on her past self's part. But the small rambler wasn't much to look at and Sutton hunched her shoulders a bit as she made her way to the front door.

Footsteps behind her let her know this was really happening; they were really about to follow her into her house, and she took a quiet breath as she pushed open the door and flicked on some lights. She sent up a silent prayer that she'd left the house clean. Or at least decent.

_Please, please, please. Today of all days, I'm begging you._

A couple dishes sat in the sink from breakfast and a jacket laid over the couch from when she'd decided not to take it that morning, but overall it wasn't a horrid first impression.

The Avengers, and Loki, trailed in after her. They seemed almost wary, and Sutton wondered if they thought she was planning to get the jump on them or something. As if she stood a chance. But the musing evaporated as her attention was stolen by purposeful movement.

Tony must have had sonar or something, because he spotted her laptop under some couch pillows in about _point two_ seconds from entering the house, and he was already attempting to bypass her password protection.

"Hey," Sutton snapped. "That's mine!"

"Um, aware of that. Trying to do some research."

He shooed her away flippantly and Sutton scowled. She swiped the computer from her chipped coffee table that he set it on, and tucked it under her arm as she addressed the team.

_And sort of Loki._

"Look, I think we've all had a long day. What with all of you defending New York, or failing to take it over, and me absolutely losing my mind. So I think it'd be best if we skipped the whole investigating part for now and just got some sleep then figure things out in the morning."

_As if sleep was even an option._

At the thought that people preferably needed beds to sleep in, Sutton bit her lip as she looked down the short hall.

"You guys are probably going to have to bunk up though."

Tony raised his hand as he kicked back against the couch.

"I call Natasha."

He really should have burst into flames from the looks he received from _both_ SHIELD agents.

"Kidding! I was kidding, sheesh."

In the end, she packed Thor, Loki, and the noble Steve Rogers into her roommate's bedroom, Clint and Natasha in her room, and left Tony and Bruce on the couches. Because they were shorter and they'd be able to fit.

Sutton built herself a sad little nest in the bathtub of her one bathroom. It was the only other door besides the front and back with a lock on it, and she made sure to hoard away her laptop and DVD collection behind the toilet for safekeeping.

She climbed inside the tub on top of the pile of blankets she'd found, as well as an old sleeping bag that'd been in the back of a closet, and adjusted the one last decorative pillow behind her head.

The house was quiet. Sutton breathed.

With the action ceasing and eyes on her gone, Sutton sank into the blankets. Her head spun and her stomach sank as her heart began to race. She felt like she might be sick. Still in her jeans, she ran clammy hands up and down the coarse fabric in an attempt to ground herself.

The Avengers. The Avengers were real? They were real and they were in _her house_ and she had no idea how to begin processing that.

"They're real." She said aloud. "They're in my house."

It felt ridiculous to say. Like no matter how much proof was thrown in her face she was still stupid to believe it.

It was all so much; she didn't know what to feel except raw confusion and a sort of queasiness in her stomach.

"They could dig through my laundry or judge my book collection."

Sutton curled up into a ball and raked her fingers through her curls.

" _Oh no, oh no, oh no."_

Beyond her house, what did them being here mean for the world? For everything she'd believed and thought she knew until this very moment? Their presence put a crack in the foundation of her very basic world views.

She bit lightly on her fist as she tried to stem the roar of thoughts.

"One day at a time." She reminded herself. " _One day at a time."_

It wasn't much of a comfort, but it was all she was going to get. Her mom was always better with reassurances than she was. Her eyes flickered to her phone on the edge of the tub. She desperately wanted to call up her mom and beg for advice, beg her to come over and help, but she couldn't do that.

She already told her mom she'd made it home safe and it was past midnight now. She wasn't about to tell her mom that she'd sent a text saying she was home safe before she'd actually been so.

Besides, just because she was having a mental breakdown didn't mean she had to drag her mother into it too. Lord knew her mother had already had her share of those.

No; she was an adult. She'd moved out to prove that, and she'd deal with the situation she'd found herself in on her own without collapsing anyone else's worldviews.

It felt impossible to fall asleep with all the thoughts and questions swirling around her head. But after a while they started to blur together and fade around the edges. It was too much to keep up with and not even a cheap, fiberglass tub could keep her brain from switching off for at least a few hours.

Sutton woke to instrumentals at seven thirty and groped around her to find her phone. It somehow ended up next to her and she fumbled to turn it off while simultaneously flopping out of the tub like some drunken fish, and blearily stared around the bathroom.

 _Ugh._ She needed coffee. Badly. The inside of her mouth was dry and there was a thick fog in her mind. What had she been checking on again? Her glazed eyes drifted around the small room.

_Her laptop and DVDs! They were gone!_

She was a mess of limbs then as she struggled to pull herself up to a standing position with some dignity.

_Everyone was already awake. Everyone was already awake and in her living room!_

Sutton ripped open the bathroom door and dashed the few steps down the hall to the entrance of the living room.

" _Hey!"_

Everyone turned to look at her, and it struck Sutton with a sudden clarity that she was standing there in day old clothes and sporting bedhead.

The team was spread out through her living room and the small table nook by the back sliding door. Tony and Bruce were on the couches, joined now by Natasha and Clint. Thor and Loki sat themselves at her dining table, and they made it look like it was jr. sized. Steve was in the kitchen by himself, a cup of coffee in hand and dark circles under his eyes. Sutton decided if he could come out looking like that, fretting over appearances had to take a quick backseat.

"That door was _locked_." She pointed out.

All looked unapologetic, besides Thor, who looked marginally chagrined, and Steve, who bowed his head as if she'd shamed him. Bruce, the one she expected least to cause trouble, actually shot her a cheeky smile.

"We have two master assassins, a super soldier, a god, and a couple men of science. I think we can figure out how to jimmy open a push lock."

Tony held his hand up for a high five. Bruce actually reciprocated the action after a moment's hesitation.

"And you sleep like the dead." Added Hawkeye.

"You should be thanking me anyway." Tony gestured towards her laptop as he leaned back against her couch. "I got you faster internet and stronger security. You know that ' _invalid'_ is, like, the worst password ever, right?"

"It's the principle of it!" Sutton ran her hands through her hair, a couple fingers getting caught on tangled curls. "Locked doors mean _stay out_ and- and I'm just wasting my breath."

A bit belatedly, she noticed that there were half eaten bowls of cereal and plates of food scattered over her coffee table.

"Oh hey," she said with a lame wave. "You guys hungry? No really, please, help yourself."

Everyone ignored her and Natasha picked up one of the DVDs laying out in front of her on the coffee table. She held it between two fingers up at eye level and gave Sutton a dubious look.

"Care to explain these?"

Sutton groaned and finally managed to work her fingers loose from her hair. Someone laid out every Marvel movie she owned. Which happened to be every Marvel movie available. Natasha scrutinized the one with a glossy "A" on it.

"Not really," Sutton said. "But I don't think you'll take that as an answer."

"She's catching on." Drawled Clint.

Looking down at her ruffled appearance once more, Sutton sighed melodramatically.

_Time to stall._

"Can't you all at least wait until I've rinsed off and put on clothes I haven't slept in?"

Clint's resting face slipped from neutral to peeved.

"Yeah. We've all just been kind of fighting a _horde_ of _aliens_ and slept in our suits, so..."

"We can _all_ take showers, okay? And, no," she pointed at Tony preemptively. " _Not together._ "

Tony rolled his eyes.

Somehow they all got through showers without too much fuss. Given the full house, everyone tried to be as quick as possible, and no one complained too much when the water went cold. There were only a few initial shrieks from the unlucky party.

Sutton was relieved when she finally got dressed in a clean pair of jeans and a shirt that _didn't_ have Loki on it. The rest of the team had to have makeshift outfits with whatever she could find. Natasha was close to her size, though she filled out Sutton's clothes much better than Sutton did. It was a bit more of a struggle to find suitable items for the guys. Luckily the Asgardian duo were able to make do with their own clothes, shedding their armor for the casual tunics underneath, and her roommate's boyfriend had left a drawer full of clothes that Sutton had no choice but to pillage.

She never thought she'd be grateful for that.

But even then it was hit and miss. Tony, Bruce, and Clint fared _alright_ , but Steve looked like he was wearing high water jeans and they couldn't be comfortable.

Sutton purposefully didn't even look at the DVDs as she hurried through the living room and into the kitchen. She coiled her hair on top of her head and tied it with a scrunchie as she reached for a coffee mug and filled it nearly to the brim before finishing it off with a healthy splash of creamer. There were also, luckily, a couple bagels still left, and she popped one into the toaster.

Even if they insisted on discussing the movies further, which she had no doubt they would, it would be better for them if she wasn't hungry during it. People tended not to like her when she was hangry.

With her coffee and bagel, Sutton turned to leave the kitchen only to come to an abrupt stop. The entire team was crammed into her living room, piled on the couches and waiting. Sutton eyed her small dining table, but Loki was sitting there.

So they weren't playing about getting right on this.

Sutton threw a mini tantrum in her head as she desperately tried to think of a way to dissuade them. In every movie, every book, it was generally a bad idea to look ahead. It changed the future in weird ways, didn't it? And besides, nothing beyond their time had _really_ been released yet. Not cinema-wise, at least.

"Ok look." She started, as it became evident their gazes weren't wavering. "Like I said yesterday, I'm pretty sure you're from an alternate universe or something. Here, you guys are just superheroes in movies. I can't say how accurate they are for you, but I can't let you guys watch them. We need to be focused on how to get you home, right? So, instead of interrogating _Sutton,_ how about we try interrogating _Loki._ "

"Mortal," Loki snapped from his spot at the table. He seemed especially insulted, and Steve interrupted him before he could spew out anything else.

"I agree with you about getting us home." He said. "But we also need information to help us do that."

"I'm the star of all this, right? I mean, I have the most movies. Obviously I'm the most popular."

Tony grinned as he held the DVDs with his logo and flipped them around for everyone to see. Sutton could only glower as they all began to toss in their own two cents. She waved her hand with the bagel, and the coffee in the other hand sloshed dangerously.

"I get that you're all curious, really!" Her voice rose over their conversation and she tried to channel her best _work phone call_ tone. "But think. Knowing things could destroy space-time or mess up your future or something! It's just too dangerous and I can't let that happen. We're not watching those movies. That's my final answer."

Sutton learned, rather abruptly, that telling super-powered heroes "no" didn't ever end with you winning.

Despite her desperate arguments that the movies she had wouldn't show "anything new" and would only share perhaps more intimate moments with everyone, Clint and Nat still pinned her against the couch between them while Tony popped _The Avengers_ into the DVD player.

Sitting between the two assassins was a constant reminder that they could disable her quite thoroughly if she so much as flinched to get up, and Sutton sat petulant throughout the movie, sulking. Out of habit, she laughed lightly at some of the comedic moments at first, but the scathing looks she received quickly shut her up.

She hoped that they were all _thoroughly_ embarrassed at having their more private scenes watched. They deserved it.

Only when Coulson's death scene came up did she feel truly terrible. It had already made her sad the first time seeing it, but it hit differently now that fictional characters were living and breathing and in her house.

If they existed, so did Coulson.

Sutton's stomach churned and she curled back into the couch cushion. Bruce paled and Clint sat stiffly. Natasha reached over Sutton to put a hand over his and Sutton glanced up in time to see the other woman's pressed lips and creased brows.

She felt like the food at the bottom of her garbage disposal.

Her eyes drifted to Loki, unbidden, and his face was unreadable as he watched himself on the screen. He must have felt her gaze, though, because he looked in her direction and studied her right back. After a moment he gave her a haughty smirk, but the expression was off and Sutton looked away.

The moment the credits started to roll, she seized the opportunity to leap from the couch and started to dash for the DVD player.

"Okay! It's over!"

Clint snagged the belt loop of her jeans and yanked her back down onto the couch.

"What's the rush? Let's just enjoy the credits. I like this music."

He looked at her pointedly and Sutton felt heat rise in her. The rest of the Avengers looked at her rather knowingly as well and her gaze shifted over to the laptop still in Tony's possession. They'd probably had plenty of time before she woke up to do some research on Marvel in general. Sutton dropped her head to the side in chagrined exasperation and sighed.

"You already know there's an end credit scene then?"

Clint tilted his head back, a smug tilt to his lips that he couldn't quite fight back despite the clear lack of sleep in the darkness of his eyes.

"Nope. But we do now. _Thank you, for your cooperation_."

Sutton stiffened and her face puckered in insult; she was trapped back on the couch again and unable to rip the DVD out of the player as they let the credits roll.

"You're the worst." She bit out.

Thanos wasn't a welcome sight for anyone on the team or otherwise, even if the main team had no idea who he was.

"Who the heck is the space god-father." Tony sneered. "He doesn't exactly give me the warm fuzzies."

"You think?" Steve snapped back. "He's an associate of Loki's, of course he's bad."

The weight of what they were actually discussing pressed in on Sutton, and she sank even lower into the couch. They were real, so Thanos was real. The thought of battles and fights and bad guys weren't as fun to think about when they were real with real people involved in them.

_People could die._

"He's not an associate." Sutton interrupted the start of some pointless bickering. "He's actually worse than Loki."

The room let out a collective groan, but Loki remained still. There was a haunted knowingness in his eyes and, if possible, his skin had lost some color. He looked less threatening like that.

"Of course he is." Bruce groaned. "Why not?"

Tony stretched his fingers out in front of him, looking like a cheesy hacker in a movie from the beginning of the decade.

"Let's wikipedia the crap out of this guy."

A spike of unease shot through Sutton, but there was little she could do in the way of stopping him. She sighed and rubbed at her head.

"And this is where we mess up the space-time continuum."

"Or improve it." Tony snapped back. "I'm not exactly keen on fighting some intergalactic gangster blind when I can do some intel gathering."

"You're not going to like what you find."

It wasn't her fault, she told herself, if they messed up their world. It wasn't her fault if they refused to listen to her and regretted it later. Just because she found them didn't make her responsible for them, right?

Sutton gnawed at her lower lip.

She still couldn't figure out how they'd gotten in front of her car in the first place. If the Tesseract could traverse dimensions like that, how terrifyingly powerful was it really? A new, horrifying thought occurred to her, and she turned to Loki, her face cold.

"Thanos can't, like, jump dimensions too, can he? He can't follow you here?"

Loki sat up straighter, but he masked any sort of sign of nervousness with a raised brow and an elegant shrug. If Sutton hadn't already been recovering from a Hiddleston addiction, she might have swooned a little.

"I don't know," he said. "And even if I did, I couldn't say."

His tone made her prickle.

"You better hope he can't." She shot back. "Because I can't imagine he'd be too pleased to see you either."

Steve reached a hand out in placation, his expression leaning more towards irritation.

"Let's just focus on the task at hand. What makes this guy so bad? Can you tell us that?"

Sutton shrugged and gestured towards an enthralled Tony.

"He'll probably know just as much as me or more in a minute. I'm not a super big comic geek; that'd be my brother. All I know is that Thanos is always trying to hit on Death and basically unbeatable."

"Hit on?"

Thor tilted his head in question, and Sutton waved her hand in explanation.

"Like, woo her," she said. "He's got a mega crush on her, I guess, and tries to impress her by destroying planets. Hence the smirk when The Other mentioned courting death."

"That would be the sort of good information to have."

Natasha did not look amused by Sutton's unenthusiastic sharing. Sutton supposed she couldn't blame her. She grimaced at the pointed, accusing glare, and was saved by her cell phone ringing.

She scrambled to answer it and gave a not entirely sincere apologetic smile as she dipped.

"Hello?"

"Sutton, I am so sorry!"

Sutton deflated, her shoulders slumped and she sighed while putting a hand on her hip.

"Hi, Chase."

"No, I'm serious. I messed up. I just- it was only supposed to be a drop in, but-"

"It's _fine_ , Chase. I found you and everything worked out."

Truth be told, she was still a bit miffed, but he _was_ apologizing. And she hadn't wanted to be a burden on him in the first place. She probably shouldn't blame him for ditching her a little.

"Well," he said, "I just wanted to say sorry. And I'm definitely not doing shots anymore."

Sutton rolled her eyes.

"I'll be rooting for you. Really, it's okay. You're probably suffering more with the way you dropped on the couch."

He laughed lightly with a wince to his words.

"Yeah. I'm paying for my choices now."

"Hey," Sutton said. "I actually have a couple errands to run, so I'll talk to you later, okay?"

"Right; sure. Thanks for being so chill, Sutton! You're the best!"

"Yeah, I know."

She hung up with another eye roll and shoved her phone in her pocket. Unfortunately, she hadn't lost anyone's attention during the phone call. Natasha cocked her head a little to the side.

"Was that the guy you were dragging out of your car last night? You sure let him off the hook easy."

Sutton shrugged and ran a hand through her hair.

"Oh, well, that's just Chase for you. And no harm no foul, right? I should have kept a better eye on him, _ha._ "

Natasha hummed in the back of her throat with an evaluating look on her face and Sutton looked away.

"Wonderful." Tony interrupted. "This purple behemoth is _literally_ unbeatable? Oh look, we turn him to stone once. Doesn't seem to stick. And he… _kills us_ once? Yeah. Slightly uncool."

The room began to rise in alarm and volume at that and Sutton rubbed at her face.

"Perhaps, Lady Sutton," said Thor, "despite your fears, we may actually use this event for our advantage."

"Well, the comics aren't-"

The discussions were starting to drown each other out. Of course, the one weekend she tried to do something adventurous would be the one to give her a migraine. She raised her head up to see the teams bickering and it reminded her of the helicarrier scene from the movie. Her eyes flitted to Loki and she found him already observing her, a calculating sort of contemplation growing on his face.

She had to put a stop to this. They had to go home. _He_ needed to go home.

"Okay! Enough!"

The room quieted at her outburst and she moved back towards the couch.

"This is what I'm talking about." She said. "You don't know what's going to happen with all this. Heck, I don't even know. They could take your story in a million different directions, but now you're all panicked. And, and, _ugh!_ "

She sat back down and aggressively rubbed at her temples.

"You aren't even supposed to exist." She muttered.

The room was still. Steve blinked. Tony lifted an eyebrow.

"Who's to say," he asked, "that you don't just have people who can see into our dimension and copy it?"

She deadpanned.

"This movie came out close to a year ago, and you all just zapped here from New York. How could that have happened if we just got a peek, Mr. IQ?"

Tony sneered at the nickname, but she elicited a few smirks from most everyone else.

Her gaze drifted passed Loki again and she froze. A look of some dawning realization was creeping across his face, and he wasn't cuffed or muzzled or restrained in any way. She eyed him suspiciously as long as she dared before her stomach grew cold and she turned back to the group.

Natasha crossed one enviously perfect leg over the other and gestured toward Sutton.

"As much as I'm all for intel, she has a point. We need to focus on figuring out a way home. Fury is probably having a fit, and it'd be nice to send _that one_ back to his own planet."

Loki stiffened at her flippancy and Clint nodded.

"Tasha's right. How about the science bros get at it then. You can try building a StarGate with her toaster or something."

"Science bros?" Sutton perked up. "Did you look that up?"

"Uh. No."

"Oh. Well, it's just a thing."

Steve leaned forward in his seat inquisitively.

"A thing?"

"Yeah." Sutton brushed it off. "Just whatever you do, please don't look up _superhusbands_. Trust me on this."

She made a face and Steve frowned, a wary sort of confusion crossing his face. It was somehow cute.

"Okay." Interrupted Bruce. "Can we get back on task? Again?"

Bruce and Tony shuffled and strutted back to her kitchen to discuss science and thermo-whatevers. Sutton considered googling some of the words they were using later. If she could remember them.

The two assassins took control of her laptop, so she decided not to fight them about it. She'd rather keep all her fingers, thank you. That left America's mascot and the two extraterrestrials to entertain. Sutton took a deep breath and exhaled.

And then her phone rang again.

"Ah! Gosh dangit!"

She fumbled to answer it and paled when she saw the caller ID.

"Mom!" She crooned. Her voice switched to sweet, and she gave a stern look to the room as a signal to stay silent.

"Hey sweetie." Her mom said. "I was just calling to check on you. I know you said you got home safe, but I just like to make sure. How was your comic con thingy?"

"Oh, good, good. You know. Really crowded, but they have, uh, cool stuff. A lot of cool costumes, and, uh, stuff."

There was a brief pause.

"Are you okay, hun? You sound a little stressed."

Sutton winced and hunched over slightly. Crap. Her mom could _not_ be allowed to suspect something was up. If she thought something were wrong, she might come over, and then how was Sutton supposed to explain the extra people in her house?

She wracked her mind for anything to cover up with. Oh wait. A truth.

"Oh, no. I'm okay. It's just, ah, Chase ran off for a bit and I had to find him. But it's all fine."

"He left you alone in Seattle? I thought that's why he came with you in the first place!"

Sutton held out a placating hand despite talking on the phone.

"I know, I know. But it's fine. He apologized."

Her mother harrumphed over the line. In the background, Sutton could hear stomping and Tyrese's voice shouting to be heard through the receiver.

"Sutton! Did you get me anything?"

Once again she winced. It wasn't that she hadn't _wanted_ to. But she'd only been able to budget for the tickets and food. She hadn't even gotten anything for herself.

"Ah, I'm sorry, bud." She said.

She could hear Tyrese's little sigh and it broke her heart.

"That's okay." He consoled.

"But-" She added. She eyed the various people around the room and locked back onto Thor and Steve. "I, um, got a couple pictures of some Avenger cosplayers. I know you like Captain America."

"Really?" His voice perked back up. "Did you see Falcon too?"

Sutton frowned.

"No, I didn't see a Falcon, sorry."

"Tyrese, this was my conversation." Her mother scolded.

"Sorry, mom. But that's okay too, Sutton. I still like Cap! Did you know, in the newest issue-"

There was more shuffling over the line and Sutton couldn't help her fond smile.

"How about you tell her next time you see her, okay? She probably doesn't want to talk on the phone all day, baby."

" _Fine_. Bye Sutton! You can give me the pictures when I come over to visit!"

Sutton didn't know how to say she wasn't sure when that could happen, so she didn't.

"Sounds good, bud." She said instead.

"Vicki is gone on vacation, right? We wouldn't be bothering her if we stopped by."

Nothing so far had made her feel more terrified. Sutton yanked at a lock of hair and let out a fake laugh.

"Right! I just- you'll have to give me heads up, or- ah. I can text you a good time. She's gone for a good while so, you know, plenty of time. I mean, besides, Howard cooks when I visit you, and his food is so good-"

Her mom must have mistaken the reason for her stammering, because she laughed.

"If your house is messy it's fine, Sutton. We'll always give you a heads up. And don't worry. You're always free to visit us instead."

Well, at least her mom didn't think she was hiding anything.

"Sounds great, mom."

Easy. Maybe her lying was actually getting better.


	3. Chapter 3

Thor and Steve were engaged in light conversation by the time she hung up with her mother, and Sutton felt a twinge of awkwardness. Everyone was busy doing their own thing. If she were alone, like she had been, she would have read a book or surfed the web, or something, but now she felt like she had to _be there_. Exactly like having party guests that refuse to leave.

Her safest bet was with Thor and Steve, so she moseyed over and rocked on her heels as she butted into their conversation. Steve gave her a polite smile and she wondered how annoying she was on a scale of zero to one hundred.

"Sorry." She blurted. "For that." She jerked a thumb back to where she'd been talking on the phone. "And earlier. And just everything. I don't really know what I'm doing."

"You're doing fine." He reassured her. "You're going through a lot, I'm sure. I thought it was bad enough waking up in the future."

"Yours still might be worse." She frowned and stopped herself before she kept talking. It felt wrong to be too candid. As far as the movie had shown, he was still struggling to adjust to his situation. She decided not to say anything about having her family or home to go back to.

"What happened to me is just zany." She settled on.

Eager to sidestep any uncomfortable or overly vulnerable conversations, Sutton turned her attention to Thor. She only noticed then that he still had a tight grip on mjolnir and he kept a careful eye on his brother.

"Hey Thor, I was wondering, do you know anything about alternate dimensions? I mean, you are from an entirely different planet. Has anything like this ever happened before?"

Thor turned to her and shook his head. His hair was so silky and golden. She wondered briefly what kind of shampoo he used.

"I'm afraid not, Lady Sutton. I have only ever known of the Nine Realms and of the wildness beyond. If anyone has seen more, it would be my brother. But I'm afraid he may not be forthcoming with any answers."

They all turned to Loki for confirmation and he grinned maliciously at them.

"You would be correct, for once."

It really wasn't fair that he had the voice of Tom Hiddleston.

"Hey!" Clint shouted from the couch and they all turned to face him. He looked excited for the first time since she'd met him. He read something on the computer screen with near delight. "Actor me is still awesome! He likes guns."

Clint stilled and peered at the screen as if scrutinizing something.

"Tasha, is that really my resting face? The one next to Grumpy Cat?"

"Yes."

"Hm. Good."

Steve dipped his head down in annoyance.

"Really Clint?"

Thor brightened and moved to join the pair.

"Research mine next," he said. "I would like to see if he's actually capable of any great feats."

Sutton had to go to the store that afternoon. There really wasn't an option. All of the Avengers needed suitable clothes, personal hygiene products, and food. A lot more food. Like, all her paycheck was going towards groceries. As if she wasn't poor enough already. But she couldn't quite drag them all with her to Walmart. _That_ would go over _so_ well.

Nonetheless, she needed help, so she brought along the two master assassins. Because if anyone could be stealth, it would be them.

She did as much as she could to disguise them. She forced Natasha into an oversized sweatshirt and both of them into ball caps, but it still left her feeling nervous.

She wanted to speed them through the trip; Sutton swore they were getting stares. The last thing she needed was paparazzi flashing their cameras for pictures to sell to obnoxious tabloids shouting,

_THEY GO TO WALMART! THEY'RE JUST LIKE US!_

Nat crossed her arms and leaned over the cart as she propelled herself over the linoleum, one foot on the cart so she was able to ride it. Clint walked next to her with his hands shoved in his jacket pockets and looked bored. Sutton held the list in her hands and swiped at her hair.

"Okay, in and out. Easy." She said. "Piece of cake. We got this."

"We'll be perfectly fine if you stop looking like you're about to have an aneurysm." Nat said, tone flat.

Clint paused to peer into a bin hazardously filled with five dollar movies. He picked up _Shrek_ and nodded thoughtfully then tossed it in the cart.

"And besides," he added. "People don't notice things. Not unless they blatantly stand out."

"I noticed you." Sutton pointed out. She grabbed the _Shrek_ DVD and put it back into the bin.

"You noticed that we were in the street." Nat corrected. "Not who we were. It wasn't a situation you believed possible, so you came up with another, more palatable, scenario. It's just human nature."

"We're the professionals, right?" Clint reminded her. "If we're not worried, you're not worried."

Sutton let out a huff and folded the list to shove in her pocket.

"Fine. Let's just get clothes and stuff done first then."

They pretty well wiped out the men's clearance section of their jeans and cheap, ugly graphic tees. But Sutton didn't have the funds for them to be picky; especially not when there was still food to buy. Natasha was able to pick out her own clothes and Sutton had to step in and put a limit on the number of hoodies in the cart.

"You can wear mine if you want to."

Nat pouted as she put a striped zip up hoodie back on the rack.

"Fine." She said. "But you're not allowed to complain about it."

"Deal."

They moved onto the food shopping next. Every time Clint reached for something Sutton had to smack his hand away and stop him from piling the cart with gratuitous amounts of junk food. Though she let the box of pop tarts slide.

And in the end, they were right. No one made a scene or seemed to notice them at all, and the cashier didn't even bat an eye at her array of purchases. Still, she insisted on going straight home, intent on not pressing her luck. She could only hope her house was standing when she got there.

She breathed a sigh of relief to see the house upright. No singe marks or blown out walls or anything. Though it was a bit suspicious that even Loki was on his best behavior. Not that she wasn't grateful for it. It just seemed… out of character.

 _Oh well._ It wasn't like she didn't have an entire house of heroes to help her deal with his scheming if she needed it.

The rest of the evening was quiet. Bruce and Tony sat neck deep in calculations that she'd never understand and everyone else seemed like they were trying to cope with their current situation. They were all off in their own self made spaces and it left Sutton uncomfortable and wandering. Nervous about intruding and being irritating to people leagues above her in life and intelligence.

It was nothing like the experience fanfictions painted it as.

According to those, she should be spazzing out and drooling over them, but also winning over their admiration because of her adorable wit and charm. This was supposed to be the time that any single male Avenger fell madly in love with her and Loki softened up and rediscovered his good side because of her purity. Right?

Wasn't that how the story usually went?

But no. Everyone was doing their own thing, in her house, and appeared to be ignoring her in general. If she were honest, she couldn't blame them. She wouldn't mind alone time herself, a few minutes not to be performing at her best for an audience. But she couldn't help the conflict within her to not be _That Person_ , while also needing to be liked.

And no blossoming lifelong friendships? No romance?

What a rip off.

Sutton decided to busy herself with setting up the small air mattress she bought instead of dwelling on her disappointed imagination and neurotic tendencies. She grinned widely to herself as she managed to shove the entire mattress into her tub.

"Sweet!"

She grabbed her blankets and threw them over top, along with the new ten dollar pillow she snatched up during their shopping trip. All-in-all, it wouldn't be the worst sleeping conditions she could have.

The light in the bathroom shifted; someone stood in the doorway. Her spine tingled.

"Miss Sutton?"

"Oh geez! Chris- Capt- er, Steve! Hey, what's up?"

Steve eyed her makeshift bed with what looked like guilt. Sutton could see his jaw clench while he thought. It _was_ a nice jaw.

"You shouldn't have to sleep in here again," he said. "You're already letting us stay in your home and eat your food."

Sutton stood up and stretched, popping her back, and brushed off his concerns.

"Oh, it's no big deal. I don't mind. Besides, I've gotten to meet all of you! For real! No one else gets to say that."

Steve still frowned. His brow puckered just like in the movies when he did that. She thought it was cute.

"It still isn't right that we're putting you out."

"I _really_ don't mind. I actually prefer it. I have a door and it locks, even if you can all open it. I mean, not that I don't trust you guys-"

She floundered to recover, but Steve only nodded.

"No, I understand. It makes sense. You don't know us. And Loki is here. I just want to make sure we aren't taking advantage of your hospitality."

If she remembered correctly, they'd told her she was going to house them or face detainment, but she still grinned at his chivalry.

"You're a great guy, Steve. Don't let anyone ever convince you that being a gentleman is a bad thing. We need more of that."

Steve blushed. She blushed in retaliation. Crap. Was that too weird? She was being too weird.

"I agree," said Steve.

Sutton lunged for the olive branch.

"Well, then. Want to maybe help me make some dinner?"

They needed more food than one person could handle making on their own. Steve inclined his head in acquiesce.

"Guess we ought to start now if we want to eat tonight."

"We certainly have our work cut out for us."

The next morning came too early. Sutton pulled on her work skirt and blouse, finished her bathroom routine, and tiptoed out to the living room in a fog. Bruce still slept, but the other couch was mussed and empty. Upon entering the kitchen, she found the person in question. Paper was scattered all over her counters and a pot of coffee already brewed in the corner. Sutton gave Tony a silent nod and poured herself a cup. With an acceptable amount of creamer added, she took a long sip and sighed happily.

"Do you ever sleep?" She asked.

Tony looked up from his calculations with a pen behind his ear and some ink staining his fingers, to give her a grin.

"I got a few hours. Why? You worried about my beauty sleep? Don't. I don't really need it."

Sutton rolled her eyes.

"I just can't understand morning people." She waved her hand in a circular motion. "Or all-nighters either, I guess."

Tony shrugged.

"Research isn't going to do itself. Besides, it's not like I had better things to do."

Sutton gestured to the paperwork with her mug-free hand.

"Have you gotten anywhere with it?"

"You know, I invited it to dinner, but it's been playing hard to get."

She snorted through her nose, still conscious of the other people sleeping. Or, if they weren't either, they weren't out and about.

"I forgot your sass doesn't turn off."

With a quick glance at her phone, she straightened from where she leaned on the counter and started moving about.

"I have to go to work, but I feel weird leaving…."

"We're adults, kid. We'll be fine. No trouble from us, scouts honor."

Sutton sighed.

" _Uh-huh._ Okay. Well, if you're all gone when I get back, I'm going to assume you made it home."

It was Tony's turn to snort as he scratched more numbers on his paper.

"I may be a genius, but I'm not a miracle worker."

Sutton left the kitchen and grabbed her car keys with a backwards shrug.

"I don't know. You did create a mini arc reactor first try."

Tony looked up sharply, as if surprised by the praise. Another grin grew on his face.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were enabling me."

She almost made it out the door, but poked her head back in for one more rebuttal.

"I'll try not to stroke your ego too much. Pepper wouldn't approve."

Work was oddly normal from the moment she walked in. Mundane. But it didn't feel like it. It felt new. Sutton walked into the office and bit her lip. Bubbles rose and popped inside her. It felt like everyone would know what happened just by looking at her. No one said anything about it, of course, but when Jen, a fellow secretary, smiled with a _hello,_ Sutton grinned nervously back.

She tacked a few keys, entered some appointment information, and cleared her throat.

"Hey, Jen." She tried to keep her voice light. Unconcerned. She for sure had nothing to hide. Not at all. Not an entire fictional superhero team in her house. "Did I miss anything Friday?"

Jen rolled her eyes good-naturedly and flicked back her blonde hair.

"Ugh. No. Not unless you count Randy almost getting into another verbal fight with a customer over prescription glasses 'missing something'. What about you? Have a good weekend? How was comic con?"

Sutton tried not to flinch in her seat or start sweating.

"Oh, it was good. Pretty normal stuff." She lied. "Chase was a jerk and got drunk though."

Jen _tsked_ behind her teeth and crossed one leg over the other.

"Well, it isn't much better here. Randy is as good as drunk most of the time, you know that. Get ready for more suffering, Salt Sister."

Sutton laughed, but looked around, scandalized.

"Jen! Shh!"

Jen shrugged and started typing away again.

"It's not like it's a secret."

With another chuff, Sutton started working as well.

Eight, mind melting hours later she finally made it home. She took a moment to breathe after pulling up in front of her house. It was, once again, still standing. That was appreciated. It was a rental, after all.

Rummaging through her purse, she pulled out a hair clip and clamped her brown curls to the back of her head and rolled up her sleeves.

"It's show time."

An explosion rocked her frame as she walked through the door. Sutton jumped. Her eyes flew to the living room as she tried to identify what made that noise.

She took a breath with a hand to her chest and glared.

Her television was on and a few of the teammates were watching _Captain America_ with the volume a few notches too high. She should have guessed they'd be going through the series.

"The volume doesn't have to be quite so loud." She suggested, but none of them heard her.

She let out an irritated grunt and got a good look at her house. Someone had pushed the couches back a few feet and there were blankets and food wrappers strewn about. The pop tarts she just bought had been found and demolished.

She shrugged off her purse and dropped it to the floor then began to try and tidy up a little. Bruce and Tony still maintained residence in her kitchen surrounded by equations and scientific nonsense. She shuffled in with the collected trash and mumbled.

"Lucy, I'm home."

Bruce looked up and smiled sheepishly when he noticed her armful of clutter.

"Sorry, we haven't done a good job of watching the kids."

Sutton smirked at his dry humor and relaxed a bit.

"Hey, you wouldn't mind if we disassembled a few of your lesser used electronics, would you?"

Her eyes flew over to Tony where he fiddled with her toaster, then scanned the rest of her countertops.

"What did you destroy?"

Tony put the toaster down and held up his hands in mock surrender. Sutton snatched up the toaster and cradled it against her chest.

"Nothing! Yet. But you can't expect us to get home without some tech, can you? Speaking of, do you know if this universe has any portable thermo-"

"Probably not." Sutton cut in. She placed the toaster carefully back down in its designated corner. "And if you trash any of my stuff, I expect it to be replaced. I'm poor enough as it is."

"See, Bruce. It's always the plebeians that are the most materialistic."

Tony shook his head; Bruce gave a small smile but remained quiet. Sutton rolled her eyes.

"To think I ever complimented you," she said. "And I'm sorry if I don't have enough money to rebuild and remodel my entire house every time I trash it in a robot brawl or it gets blown up."

Tony's head shot up.

"My house hasn't ever been blown up."

Sutton startled and then flushed.

"Oh, you know what! I need to get changed!"

"HEY."

She scurried off to her room in a hurry, found it gloriously empty, and slammed the door closed behind her. Obviously she needed a moment to regroup and start watching what she said. She really wasn't good at the " _having company"_ bit. Or the " _keeping her mouth shut_ " bit either.

She slid out of her skirt and blouse and pulled on a more comfortable pair of jeans and a t-shirt. Even though she'd put her hair up moments before, she let it down again as she sat on her bed.

Had she just screwed up again? It wasn't like Tony couldn't google this sort of thing. It was a bit surprising he hadn't yet, actually. But maybe he was too distracted by trying to figure out how to travel dimensions.

Sutton dug her fingers into her scalp and tried to ward off another headache before it happened.

_Ugh._

She shouldn't stress. It wasn't a big deal. Even if Tony was mad at her for not saying anything, it'd be fine.

There was no need to stress at all. No reason. She was fine. It was a stupid stray comment and she was just strung up from work. All she had to do was follow her grandmother's advice and "suck it up".

"An irritating lot, aren't they? I'm sure, now, you may better understand my plight."

Sutton shot off the bed with a short, piercing screech, and spun around to her bedroom door. It wasn't Steve towering in the doorway this time. It was Loki.

Just Loki.


	4. Chapter 4

Her heart hammered against her ribcage and her hands went immediately clammy.

_Tha-thump, tha-thump, this was where she died, tha-thump, tha-thump._

"Mmm." She hummed in terrified agreement. "Well, I should probably go. Make sure they're not… breaking stuff."

She took two shuffling steps forward. Loki didn't move and she was forced to stop.

"Why leave so soon? I don't believe we've had a chance to converse, mortal."

Sutton waved off the comment, trying to breathe in quietly through her nose. If he didn't know she was terrified, maybe he wouldn't try anything sinister. Or dastardly. Or villainous.

"That's okay! You don't need to worry about it. I'm fine. I should just go make dinner."

"Living up to your potential, I see."

Her face grew hot and her muscles stiffened. Living up to-? What did he know about her potential? He had no idea what she was working for before they dropped in.

"Hey!" She snapped. "Just because I-"

But at the sight of his pleased face she realized he was goading her and cut herself off. She dropped her shoulders and looked passed him to the door.

"What do you want, Loki? I don't think I need to remind you that there's a gang of superheroes in my living room."

Loki scoffed at her not-so-subtle threat.

"Your heroes do not concern me at the moment. Come now, let's have a chat."

He gestured for her to have a seat on her own bed. Sutton remained still, eyes still on the door.

"If you call out," he said, "they will not hear you."

She frowned and swallowed thickly. With no other option, she eased over to her mattress and sat down stiffly.

"Now, that wasn't so hard."

Her use of proper posture would have brought a tear to her grandmother's eye. Her spine was erect, feet together on the floor, hands in her lap. All it had taken was potential death.

"What is this about? I have nothing you could want."

Loki cocked his head to the side in her peripheral vision, he raised an eyebrow and a small smirk curved up his face.

"Oh, I doubt that." Involuntarily, Sutton's heart fluttered. "But don't worry. I haven't come to collect. Not yet. I simply want to… confirm a suspicion."

Sutton couldn't help but shoot a perturbed glance at him. This was certainly more in line with fanfic, but she didn't particularly like it.

"And what suspicion would that be?"

Her voice came out a bit more wobbly than she'd intended. Loki tsked at her.

"Not yet, not yet. Now just hold still and you won't be harmed."

"What!"

But he was quick, and before she could resist he was right before her. Much closer than she would ever be comfortable with. He took the first two fingers of his right hand and placed them to the center of her forehead, and Sutton could not move. An electric pulse ran down her spine, gripping it tightly, and she was paralyzed. She let out a quiet gasp as she tried to escape his hold.

It felt like he was pulling something from her.

No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't move away. After a few moments more his face broke out into a maniacal grin and he stepped back. Sutton let out a ragged breath and shoved herself off the bed as she stumbled away from him.

"What did you do?"

"I found what I was looking for." He said curtly.

She glared.

"And what in the world would that be?"

Loki's smile turned savage.

"Potential."

The word didn't sit well with Sutton, nor did the promise. The room was too small. She finally weaseled around him and dashed for the door. Loki didn't move to stop her.

"Just stay away from me!"

She didn't look behind her to see his reaction. She needed to get back out to the living room. With other people.

With frazzled nerves and a disheveled attitude, she burst into the living room from the hallway. Those who had been watching the movie suddenly paid her mind when they saw her flushed face and darting eyes roving over the furniture. Loki was standing in the corner of the room.

Sutton looked back down the hall, but it was empty. Her heart thudded again.

"Are you okay?"

Steve stood up first and the others scrutinized her. Sutton felt the heat in her face rise further. She pointed a forceful finger at the guilty party.

"I'm fine. Just make sure he keeps his hands to himself."

The group became suddenly, collectively, on edge. Even Tony and Bruce took a break from their science to investigate her disturbance. Thor visibly stiffened the most.

"Did he hurt you, Lady Sutton?"

The tone of his voice was too sad. Too heartbroken. She thought of Tyrese and how upset she'd be if he ostracized himself from the family. The thought made her deflate a little. That, and Loki didn't seem to mind that she outed him.

"No," she said. "He's just messing with me."

Loki cooed.

"Oh, but you did seem so fond of me before."

If possible, Sutton's red face deepened in color.

"And you were supposedly fond of a horse, but no one's bringing that up. I'm a nerd, not a psychopath. You haven't exactly been a good person lately."

Those who did understand the horse jab guffawed, but Loki didn't look amused.

"Excuse me? Are you referring to your people's vile and pathetic campfire-"

"Okay, enough!"

Natasha stepped forward and gathered everyone's attention. She shot them all a fierce glare.

"We can't let ourselves go off the rails again. Especially not now."

Steve nodded.

"Nat's right. We need to maintain focus. And Thor, you need to keep a closer eye on your brother. We can't have him out loose in this world."

Thor's hand clenched around the handle of his hammer. So he just wasn't going to be putting mjolnir down anytime soon, huh? He shot his brother a weary, pleading look, but it had no visible effect.

"I will." He ground out.

Sutton let out a heavy, shaky sigh and shook herself out.

Move on, change the subject. Too serious, too stressful, too much.

"Okay, so any breakthroughs?" She asked the science team.

Tony and Bruce looked at each other before Tony gestured for Bruce to have a go. Bruce sighed and swallowed before he took off his glasses and rubbed at his eyes.

"Not much." He said. "All we have to work with, really, is theoretical science. Some String Theory. It gets all… wonky when you try to put actual math to it."

It wasn't the sort of update anyone was hoping to hear. The energy in the room dropped before Tony stepped forward and threw an arm around his friend.

"But no worries. I mean, after all, we are the dream team. And I'm pretty sure Fury can rip a hole through time and space with his rage if we're gone for too long."

Surprisingly, Sutton could actually see that happening.

She moved to the corner of the far couch and tried to think as everyone dissipated. Sure, maybe she was still a little shook from Loki's actions, but she wasn't the important one here at the moment. There had to be a way to help everyone else. If she could even be of help.

After all, her car ran off magic and gasoline as far as she was concerned.

There wasn't a chance she would ever wrap her mind around theoretical, fringe mathematics. If she'd been able to do anything close to that, she could have snagged herself some sort of scholarship and actually stayed in college.

Besides, where did someone even start when working out fake science-? Wait a second!

Sutton jumped off the couch and hopped over to the kitchen where she shoved herself between Bruce and Tony. Totally not on purpose. Not like she needed to be BFFs with Iron Man or the Hulk or anything.

"Hey, I had an idea!"

"Oh, lord."

Bruce glanced up at Tony, his look verging on reproach, before he looked back down at her.

"Yeah?"

Oh, she'd finally scraped up a good idea. Possibly even brilliant.

"Have you tried looking at any comic books?"

Tony made a face.

"Excuse me?"

Sutton rolled her eyes and used exaggerated hand gestures to further explain.

"My brother reads them. He told me that there have been comics where people visit alternate dimensions or parallel universes. And if you all use the same comic book science, maybe you can get some info from it."

"I mean, feasibly-" Bruce started.

"It's not comic book science." Tony interjected. "It's science."

She was a bit taken back by how agitated Tony sounded. It wasn't like they had much to go off in the first place, right? They just said they weren't exactly making progress on the issue.

"Just because your sad little dimension can't figure out how to add correctly, doesn't mean our discoveries aren't legitimate." He continued. "It doesn't just work for the sake of working. We earned everything we came up with. We're not comic book characters."

Sutton held her hands up in surrender and scowled, refusing to meet his gaze directly.

"Noted." She said.

Why not just rip her head off next time?

She let out an awkward laugh as she tried to distance herself from the scolding, and switched her attention to Bruce. He looked uncomfortable with the outburst as well, with hunched shoulders and diverted gaze.

"So, um, do you think it could help?" She asked. "Maybe?"

"Maybe." He conceded. "I'd be surprised if they were detailed enough to give us something to work with though. But anything is worth a shot at this point."

She panned back over to Tony cautiously. He had one brow raised and his arms crossed over his chest. Sutton puckered her lips and crossed her own arms.

"Should I start googling stuff, or do you have some fancy, real algorithm for key phrases that my feeble mind can't comprehend?"

Tony snorted and flicked his hand at her flippantly.

"I'll take care of it, kid. You wouldn't know what to search for anyway."

Alrighty. So Tony Stark could still be an annoying jerk. Good to know.

The house really was too small for all of them.

In the other room there was still an empty seat left on her couch. One glorious, padded seat. She decided to claim it and sank into the cushion as she threw her feet up on her coffee table. They were only on their second day and they already made her job seem like less of a chore. And that was saying something.

Thor kept a steady eye on Loki, as if he hadn't been already, and while she felt bad that he had to, she was still grateful. Loki's little altercation put her on edge. She didn't like the idea that he thought she had something he could find useful. Which was, of course, ridiculous, because she was a boring human. But he was crazy, right? And you couldn't exactly convince crazy people that they were wrong about something.

She pulled her knees up and rested her chin on them with a shudder. No need to focus on that. There were other things for her to think about.

Like tomorrow. What was she going to do tomorrow? Work. She was going to that job again. Then… errands? Did whatever remains of local Radio Shacks that existed still carry anything useful for portals or opening rifts in spacetime? How weird would it be for her to ask?

Her phone went off again in her pocket; somehow her volume had been turned on, and she scrambled to answer it. Things were certainly strange nowadays. She didn't usually get so many phone calls in such a short period of time.

"Hello?"

"Okay, Sutton. What exactly did happen the other night?"  
"Chase? What are you talking about? You called yesterday."

"I know. I know I was drunk. I'm talking about after that. I can't remember and- are you messing with me? Was this payback or something?"

Unease clashed with irritation as she flopped backwards and threw one arm over the couch.

"I ask again. What are you talking about? I dumped you on your couch, like a nice person. I could have left you on the floor."

"People came by my house today asking if I'd seen anything weird. But they wouldn't explain anything. Did you send them? You better tell me, 'cause I'm wiggin', okay?"

Sweat beaded over her skin and she sat up, spine straight and eyes wide.

"W-what? Seriously? Who were they? What did you say?"

Her frantic tone drew attention from the room yet again. Even Chase managed to notice.

"That wasn't you?" He cursed over the line. "That's frickin' spooky, man. They were wearing suits and had badges and everything, Sutton. Something really weird must have happened. All I could remember babbling about was fireworks? But I told them if anything happened, you might've seen it."

"You told them WHAT!"

"I"m sorry! I was freaked out and they seemed legit! Look, they left my house without, like, arresting me or zapping me or anything. If they come by just- just say you didn't see anything."

"I didn't see anything!" Sutton insisted. "What the heck, Chase? You just send some Creepy Pasta worthy freaks my way?"

"Oh, snap. You're right. This is so going on reddit."

If she'd thought the urge to strangle him had been strong the other night, it was nothing compared to the homicidal urge within her now.

"If I end up disappearing or dead." She said, her voice near murderous. "I hope you never get interviewed for my episode on Sixty Minutes."

"Hey! You'll be fine, ok? I swear. You can call me if you see them, and I'll come over-"

"No." She interrupted. She held out her hand as if to stop his stream of thought and curled her fingers as she let out a breath.

"You're right. I'm- I'm sure it'll be fine. You've been drunk and hung over all this time anyway, right?"

"Wow. Rude."

"Thanks for the heads up, Chase. I have to go."

"Get video if you can."

"Bye, Chase."

The second she hung up, Sutton leaped from her seat and hopped in a panicked circle.

"Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap!"

Everyone in the room, privy to her conversation, looked concerned. Well, Loki looked a bit more disgusted by her behavior than concerned. However his approval, or lack of it, was the least of her worries.

She had the Men in Black possibly after her now.

"What's wrong? What happened?" Asked Steve.

Sutton pulled at her hair and bit her lip.

"Some, I don't know, government weirdos went to Chase's house. They asked him if he saw anything weird the night you guys poofed here!"

Clint and Natasha looked to each other and back at her with expressions of slight concern.

"Was he sure?" Asked Clint. "You said he was drunk."

Sutton looked off into space and felt the beginnings of an ulcer.

"He sounded sure; he was pretty freaked out. And he told them to talk to me! Me. They're going to come here and think I kidnapped all of you, or cloned you or something. And I'll end up in a secret government prison, and you'll all send up in a lab somewhere underground in North Dakota!"

Natasha shot her partner a prompting look and nodded toward Sutton. Clint's lips pulled flat and he shook his head. Steve, of all people, stepped up to the plate and sat next to her. He lifted an arm as if to put it around her shoulders, but dropped it and looked off to the side.

"Hey. It's okay. Everything will be fine and no one is going anywhere. We just need to be prepared."

The words didn't bring comfort. Captain America was an optimist. That was his thing. He was supposed to look on the bright side even if there wasn't one. He was the morale booster and confident leader. But that wasn't how the real world worked. At least, not Sutton's real world. Here, the bad guys could win. They often did. And maybe now she would be the weird story on the news of the vanishing woman who everyone pitied for five seconds before moving on with their life.

She clutched her elbows and closed her eyes while she tried to ground herself.

"Just lie." Natasha said bluntly. "Tell them you didn't see anything and move on."

_And oh. Wasn't that just a fabulous idea._

"That would work wonderfully if I could actually lie to save my life. I was one sentence away from my mom being suspicious last night. And what if you guys give off a weird electron energy or something? Like you two."

She pointed to Thor and Loki. Thor looked scandalized. He might as well have put a hand daintily to his chest and gasped, "moi?"

"They could have spectrometers with them or dogs or those readers from Men in Black."

"Aye, just calm down." Clint said. He looked like he was already over this entire development. "We have more pressing issues to deal with than some government officials. I think we can easily take care of them if needed. Pull yourself together, kid."

Why did everyone keep calling her that?

"I'm an adult, thank you."

"Then act like it."

Sutton paused. She sucked in air through her nose. She flushed. The room was quiet and Sutton tried to pull herself together. The science team decided to join them then to discover what all the hullabaloo was about.

Clint was right and she was mad at him for it. So she needed to stop freaking out? Like that was easy. She wasn't a trained SHIELD agent. She was ordinary. Heaven forbid she have a panic attack.

How many attacks had she had in the last two days?

Just because nothing had happened yet didn't mean nothing would.

But, yet. Nothing had happened yet, and she was still alive. That had to count for something. If she could survive an assault by Loki, surely she could survive a couple guys in suits, right?

What was it her mom always repeated when she complained about things?

Be what you're longing for. Be strength, be bravery, be a good friend. Blah.

Maybe it was time she actually tried to put that into practice in a situation that would count? It was just so hard. She still didn't know how to balance the knowledge that everything she'd known about fiction could be wrong with the immediate need to act responsibly and be supportive.

She couldn't lie to people, that was true. But she could lie to herself about some things. If she told herself she wasn't bothered, was brave instead, maybe she could fake it long enough to get through this.

Sutton looked around her home at the group of characters, people, and couldn't put her thoughts to words. The Avengers were in her house. Regardless of Loki, and his ambitions, she had a capable group of people surrounding her to back her up.

Maybe they could bring their world's rules with them and there wouldn't be a problem. The good guys would win, hands down.

When she thought about it like that, what could really go wrong? Nothing.

Steve was probably right. Everything would be fine.

Those thoughts carried her through as she finally got around to making dinner. It only took her seven jump-scares every time she thought she heard a knock or a car pulling up to get it done. But still, the feared henchmen never showed up.

She relaxed slightly after sitting down to eat. Arriving after dinner hours would be incredibly rude, and they wouldn't do that. Couldn't, shouldn't.

Maybe if she put up a _No Soliciting_ sign she could have an excuse not to open the door.

The idea of a simple sign foiling some investigative officials amused her more than it should have, which might have indicated her sanity was slipping away.

Sutton took another bite of her meal and shrugged inwardly.

Oh well. She'd take a bit of relief wherever she could find it.


	5. Chapter 5

She was going to have to resign herself to the fact that she wasn't going to ever get to use her computer again. Usually after work, she'd let herself have an hour or two to just mindlessly surf the web. But no more.

No. They might as well have slapped a SHIELD sticker over the Apple logo. Or even an arc reactor sticker to take advantage of the glow and given that Tony claimed it more often than not.

At the moment, Natasha and Clint were using it for "research" purposes. She wasn't sure

if that meant looking up Marvel facts or looking into her world's government agencies. And she wasn't sure which option frightened her more.

For the time being, she busied herself with reading over her old sign language textbook. Even if she didn't have the funds to go to school at the moment, she didn't want to get rusty. That, and she still hadn't figured out how to act in her own home. Did she ignore them? Did she try to connect? Could she force them to love her and therefore become the dreaded Mary-Sue that was oh-so popular?

Oh gosh. She was a Mary-Sue, wasn't she?

Crap, no! No, she couldn't be. No one was in love with her yet. There had been no lust-filled eyes exchanged by any party. And anyway, she didn't have five first names or shop at Hot Topic. She had to be safe.

A clatter came from her kitchen and she peeked over the top of her book, nervous to look and find out what happened.

"It's all good." Tony called. "But things would be easier if you actually owned a screwdriver."

She sat up straighter.

"What did you-"

"Don't worry, it's just the toaster. I haven't even seen you use it."

"Tony." She complained as she groaned and fell back in her seat. "What about lazy grilled cheese? Huh? You've sabotaged me."

"You're a savage."

It was too late to save the appliance, so she didn't bother getting up. Sutton wiggled back down in her seat and pulled her textbook closer. Clint murmured something to Natasha and Natasha frowned. She typed something rapidly on the keyboard and grinned in smug confidence.

"Encrypted," she responded. "But not enough."

Sutton dared to crane her head and peer at the laptop screen and noted that the site looked suspiciously like a government database. Of the alphabet branch variety. She swallowed and looked away.

It was better if she didn't know.

Cap and Thor fiddled in front of her TV and she settled her attention on them instead. Why was it always the Captain and the Asgardians off from the group? Or, maybe that was looking at it the wrong way. She wondered what made them lump together versus anyone else.

Loki was the most isolated one, understandably. He sat alone leafing through, _was that her Intro to Human Psychology book?_ Okay, that probably wasn't a good thing.

Thor jabbed a finger at her DVD player and Steve held out a hand.

"That one means play," Steve explained.

"So you can read the runes."

Steve studied the box a moment more before hitting the eject button and was rewarded as the little tray popped out. Thor gave him a friendly slap to his shoulder.

"Well done!"

Sutton cracked a grin; her fingers itched to grab her phone. She should be filming this. If only there was a way to make it seem like she'd edited it together. Tumblr, the entire nerd world, would be hers to rule if she could get half of the things they were doing online. People would make gifs of _her_ in her honor and as humble thanks.

Her small laugh garnered the brief attention of Loki, though he looked irritated by the pair's delve into technology more than anything. Sutton made sure to purposefully ignore him.

 _Really_ should figure out how to take that book from him though.

Steve turned around to see what she'd found amusing and when he realized her gaze was on him, his expression shuttered and he ducked his head.

"I haven't had much time or…desire to mess with any of this stuff yet." He tried to explain.

Sutton gave him a grin and got up to join them at the DVD player.

"No, it's fine. People now just kind of take technology for granted, I think. What are you trying to do anyway?"

Steve took the DVD out of the tray and put it back in the _Captain America_ DVD case.

"Just trying to clean up. And I- I'd really rather not watch it again."

Sutton sobered up and looked away.

"That's understandable." She said.

"Rest easy, Captain." Thor tried to comfort. "You're among friends here."

Steve looked even more embarrassed, so Sutton attempted to change the subject.

"Don't worry about it, Cap." She said. "We'll get you all caught up on the good pop culture. Star Wars, some rock and roll, maybe a little bit of Harry Potter. And I swear to protect you from all things Jersey Shore or MTV in general."

Steve sneered at the mention of Jersey and Thor looked confused.

"What is this _Jersey Shore_ we need to be defended from?"

Sutton sighed dramatically.

"Only the lowest display of character that humanity has to offer." She explained. "If they were the shining example of human nature and ability, we'd probably deserve to be ruled by Loki."

Loki's head snapped up from the book and he shot her an unappreciative glower. Sutton refused to acknowledge him and tapped her chin in mock thought.

"On second thought," she mused, "maybe we should just give him Jersey to rule. He might actually do it some good."

That earned her a death glare.

"Lady Sutton, you don't understand. My brother would not-"

"Thor. I was kidding." Sutton patted him on his bicep. "I don't really think Loki should rule anything on earth."

Steve shifted. He looked like he wanted to ask her something but felt uncomfortable about it. Sutton tilted her head in encouragement.

"If that's so," he began slowly, "then why were you wearing him on your shirt? And why did you have so much to do with him on your computer?"

He shot Loki an uneasy glance, as if maybe they shouldn't be discussing her follies in front of the villain. To Loki's credit, he was doing a marvelous job of pretending to ignore them for the book.

_Seriously though. Did he have to be reading that book? As if he wasn't creepy enough already._

But Steve's statement sunk in and the hairs on Sutton's arms and neck bristled as her face heated. They were _digging_ through her _computer history?_ She wasn't even dead yet!

Another two pairs of eyes burned into her back from behind the said blasted computer.

The question of the century, it seemed then.

She mimicked a move by Bruce, and rubbed at her shoulder.

"Look, first off, I in no way support anything he did. I think he really could use some counseling. But you have to understand that it's different here, for us. Until a couple of days ago, you were all just… ideas. And there's a disconnect there. We laugh at things that in reality wouldn't be funny; we can have sympathy for villainous characters because we can see where they've come from, but still not root for them to win."

It was hard to put into simple words, but they had to have some idea, right? They still had stories and movies in their universe.

Thor took half a step forward and looked entirely too hopeful for Sutton's comfort level.

"You have hope for my brother then?"

The muscles in her back tightened and she pursed her lips. Loki was the one reading her dusty human psychology textbook.

"I don't know, Thor," she said carefully. Warning bells rang in her head announcing,

_Danger, danger, danger!_

If she wasn't cautious in her response, Loki might jump up and gut her where she stood. What was Thor thinking? He was sitting _right there_.

"Hurt-" Her eyes flickered over to Loki's figure. He hadn't moved yet, but now his violent green eyes were blatantly studying her. She swallowed thickly.

"It doesn't mend easily. Or quickly."

 _And also she hadn't seen Thor 2 yet, so she wasn't sure what exactly they were doing with his character_.

Thor frowned, his expression turning inward and Sutton bit her lip as she tried to disengage by checking her phone.

There was actually a text she'd missed. Sutton opened it, noting it was from her mom. It was a blurry picture of Tyrese off in the distance on the field. From the looks of it, her mom might've just missed capturing the moment he kicked the soccer ball.

" _He's doing so well!"_ The text read. " _Beckham watch out!"_

A string of unnecessary, cutesy emojis followed the message and Sutton snorted. He would start playing games soon, if she remembered correctly. She'd have to get the schedule from her mom.

"Oh!" She said, looking up. "Actually, ah, off topic, do you mind if I, um, take a couple pictures… with you?"

Steve's face wrinkled in obvious skepticism. Sutton waved a hand in a defensive gesture.

"Not for me! For my little brother. I told him I got him a picture with a Captain America cosplayer, since I didn't get him any souvenir. And, ah, you're actually one of his favorite heroes?"

The explanation didn't look like it did anything to actually endear Steve or encourage him to comply.

"Didn't you say it would be a bad idea for people to know we're here?"

"Right, but this wouldn't be _you._ It'd be a guy who _looked_ like you."

Steve rubbed the back of his neck and glanced at Thor as if for back up.

"Your brother could have a bit better taste, I think." Piped Thor, subtly flexing.

Something lit in Steve's eyes and Sutton's lips twisted as she recognized that look as one when she told her mom the pan "needed to soak right now".

"Won't he recognize your house though?"

That stopped her. Sutton glanced about, as if just noticing and scuffed her heel into the carpet in frustration. He was right. There wasn't one spot in her house or yard she could convince her family was a conference center in Seattle.

_Drat it!_

But she'd promised Tyrese a photo and he wasn't the sort of kid to forget that kind of

thing.

If only she had a green screen and photoshop.

Loki put down the textbook, _about time_ , and a little, _teeny_ lightbulb went off above Sutton's head.

She shuffled in place a moment and pulled at a loose curl.

"Um, do you- Thor- um, think maybe Loki, could- uh-"

"Create an illusion for you?" Loki cut in.

That was precisely what she was hoping. If he could fake a replica of himself, surely he could create a simple white wall or copy some stock image of a crowd she pulled up on google.

Loki studied her speculatively, as if trying to decide if he'd be able to benefit from helping.

"I could do it," he said. There was a taunting lilt to his voice and to Sutton it sounded like he'd just slid a piece of cake under one of those cardboard boxes propped up with a stick.

"I don't doubt you could," commented Sutton. "But, will you?"

"Ah." Loki grinned. "A more apt question."

Thor sent his brother a steely look.

"I have not forgotten your unbecoming behavior from a few days ago," he said.

Loki cocked a sassy brow.

"I'll assist you." His grinned widened. "But why not send your brother two pictures? I'm sure he'll be twice as delighted."

Steve scowled and looked ready to argue, but after their previous conversation moments ago, Sutton didn't know if she was willing to press their luck.

He wanted to unnerve her and force her to act all cheery next to him? Well, she'd show him how brave and nonchalant she could be surrounded by a room full of superheroes.

"Deal." She cut in before anyone could argue otherwise.

Besides, he might be Loki but he did still _look_ like Tom Hiddleston. And she really wasn't going to miss an opportunity for a photo with the Cap.

Steve didn't look thrilled about the agreement, but she gave him a hopeful grimace and tried to bat her eyes a little.

"Please? It would mean a lot. I'll even wave the grocery bill I've been paying for the last couple days."

Steve winced, glowered a moment, and went to go get his suit.

[]

Jen started shooting weird looks at Sutton by lunch. Honestly, she was surprised it had taken her coworker that long to notice something amiss. Though perhaps she was used to Sutton bumping into her own desk several times before finally finding her chair. Still, Sutton liked to think she didn't usually show up to work with chunks of hair pulling from a messy bun and almost nonexistent makeup.

"You okay?" Jen asked. She stapled a report together and filed it away. "You seem out of it today."

Being the only person in the office that Sutton particularly liked, she felt bad lying to Jen. But she wasn't going to be put in a mental hospital by confessing to her either. Instead she tucked some stray hair behind her ear and grinned too widely.

"Yeah! I'm totally fine!"

"You sure? Because I'm pretty certain you already emailed that report to Dave. Twice."

Sutton snapped out of her daze and choked back a made up curse as she exited out of her email box.

"Dang it!"

As if her boss wasn't already condescending enough.

She looked to the stack of reports still on her desk. Memos that needed formatting, requests to be filled, information to verify. Everyday it felt like the same thing, over and over. She sighed and put her head in her hand.

"What's wrong?"

Sutton pushed her chair away from her desk and rubbed at her temples. Maybe they were salt sisters, but there were still lines that didn't need to be crossed. And despite their complaining, Jen still managed to seem more peppy about her disdain than not. She didn't deserve any negativity.

"Nothing." Sutton said. "I just didn't get much sleep last night. I kept waking up."

"Maybe it's finally time you replace that mattress." Jen suggested.

Sutton let out a bitter laugh.

"You have no idea."

But in all honesty, it wasn't the mattress, or the tub, even if her neck _was_ starting to crick a little from that. She'd slept on worse for longer at a couple summer camps. It was her dreams that night that had kept her up, even if she couldn't quite remember them. All she knew was that there was darkness, despair, terror, and then she'd wake up. Again and again and again.

She hadn't had a real nightmare since she was a child, and it was almost too strange that she'd suddenly gotten such a vague one out of the blue.

It was all too easy to suspect Loki. Part of her felt a little bad, throwing around accusations even in her head. She didn't have _proof_ it was him, or even that he could do something like induce dreams. But her mind leaped there all the same.

If it _was_ him, hopefully it was only a one time thing. Payback, maybe, for talking about him right in front of him and the whole picture taking thing.

Even still, she didn't plan on mentioning anything to the team. They'd get worried over something that might just be her stress, and it could distract them from their goal of getting home asap.

And beyond that, how did you even stop someone from getting in your head if it was Loki? Which she still didn't have proof of.

"Please, check one of those outlet places." Jen's voice broke her out of her mindless spiral. "You look awful."

Sutton dragged her eyes to her coworker in a scowl.

"Thanks."

"I'm just saying."

Her computer pinged and she looked down as she opened up a new message.

" _Got it, Sutton. Don't need to send a third time. I've got backup copies."_

She rolled her eyes toward the ceiling and dropped her head to her keyboard. At the moment she couldn't quite decide whether it was worse at work or at home.

Home. Home was definitely worse.

Sutton's heart did a double backflip, barrel roll, and awful cartwheel as she pulled up to her driveway. There was already a car there. Some sleek, black sedan. It absolutely oozed the aura of,

_Hi, we're a shady, unknown branch of the government!_

Two shadowy figures sat inside; probably waiting for her. Sutton parked in Vicki's spot and eased out of her car. She slipped her keys between her fingers in a lame imitation of brass knuckles and edged toward her front door.

If she wasn't placed in a secret, underground government prison she was going to end up in a regular one for sure. Because she was one-hundred percent going to kill Chase.

The doors to the sedan clicked smoothly open and both figures stepped out. One was a man in casual slacks, a button down shirt, and a blazer. He had an easy smile already in place. And his hair. It was too perfect. Too blond. The other was a woman in a pencil skirt, buttoned blouse, and heels. Her dark hair was pinned up and her brows were lowered. She stood with shoulders pulled back and her lips pressed together a tad too tightly.

Sutton swallowed what little moisture remained in her throat and shifted her weight from foot to foot.

"E-" Her voice squeaked out at too high a pitch and she cleared her throat. "Excuse me, can I- uh, can I help you? Um, you- you can't solicit here."

That would make her seem innocent, right? If she seemed to assume they were just random salesmen or evangelicals of some kind first?

"And I already go to church." She added.

Genius. If she didn't know why they were there, she didn't see anything.

The man grinned too widely at her, teeth too white and straight, and stepped forward to meet her. Sutton took a step back in response.

"Oh, no, no. None of that." He assured her. It wasn't assuring at all. "My name is Matthew Johnson and this is my partner, Alyssa McKenzie. We'd just like to ask you a few questions about your evening a couple nights ago."

Sutton froze under their gazes. Her heart pulsed in her neck and she gripped her purse strap in a desperate bid not to fidget. The woman stared at her too intently. Alright, so blatant ignorance wasn't going to fly. Sutton tried to muster up some righteous anger.

"What is this about?" She tried to add an edge to her question. That hadn't sounded terrified, had it? Did her voice lilt too much? "Who are you people?"

The man held up his hand in a non-threatening gesture and dipped his head slightly. She still pursed her lips at the action, pulling her head back away from them, and her eyes darted to her front door.

"We're from the Internal Network of Secure Oversight and Live Intelligence, or INSOL." He said. "And we just want to ask you a couple questions."


End file.
